I just don't think it'll be enough to really fix the meta in such a way that other classes will be equally viable.
Like...what reason is there to stop playing Paladin or Mage? Libram Paladin still craps on just about every other deck in the game with the only downside being that it can no longer use Pen Flinger for reach. The Sword nerf is almost an indirect buff because it means you can run a smaller secret package (6 total) and still get full value from both swords most of the time.
Meanwhile Mage can easily just run Lunacy as backup because the regular gameplan of Spell Mage is so strong that it only loses to aggro which will get held at bay by the Paladins.
I honestly believe it's going to be the Libram discounters much more than the Librams (also Hand of A'dal, you can't give a ramping midrange/value deck the absolute best 1-2-3 curve in the entire game)
if it's any consolation, there's no way that Paladin won't get hit with a second set of nerfs. They've barely scratched the surface of what makes that class almost unbeatable
Oh wow I didn't think they'd actually nerf the Watch Posts already. They made it sound like they were only watching them for now, but I'm happy to not have to see them in every single deck.
Pen flinger nerf will kill it in Rogue (thank god), but I fear it will leave Paladin unchanged. They mostly just play them for the insane tempo swings anyways (although I suppose it's neat that you no longer have to eat 8 damage every turn while they keep spamming giant recruits.
Sword of the Fallen nerf is pretty significant, but I doubt it will be enough to slow down Libram Paladin, that deck doesn't rely on draw as much as it just steamrolls you from turn 1 on.
Pretty sure Deck of Lunacy nerf does nothing overall. Sure, it's slower and you can't win games starting form turn 2....but the deck itself is still incredibly powerful and Lunacy is now enough to just outvalue slower decks.
Jandice Nerf seems good enough. Making her summon 4-drops would make her unplayable because many of those are just hot garbage. At this point she can't just lock down the game when coined so that's good.
Honestly I'm not all that happy with the nerfs because I feel like the top meta decks will keep being top meta decks, even if they are weaker, while everyone else still has to come to terms with the fact that they can'T beat both Mage and Paladin at the same time.
Probably gonna have another set of nerfs in two weeks...or at least I hope so.
Identity Theft is not a joke: Either have Yoink! or find ways to discover it (Wandmaker, Scorpid, etc.)
I have a question. You need to discover 10 different hero powers. Can you dig your own hero power from Yoink? Or you need to try to get Yoink somehow as another class? How?
I couldn't get my own hero power from Yoink so far.
You can only get your own hero power if you currently have a different one, which means your best bet is to just use 2 Yoinks back to back. (Or go Wild and use Finley into Yoink).
just to clarify, I don't think she didn't know what would happen to his career, I'm just saying it's not her actual intent (or at least her proposed motive is credible). She couldn't have talked about the whole thing without that being an inevitable consequence.
Also, I'm not trying to imply that silence = guilt (although I may have phrased that one poorly), but rather that in this specific situation where it would literally just be word vs word it's incredibly irresponsible to not come out with some sort of reaction or acknowledgement.
The Slazo thing was a bit different because he actually got gaslit into thinking he did something way worse than what was actually the case while also being dogpiled by the entire commentary scene. Zalae just wasn't under nearly as much pressure while also having way less severe allegations levied against him.
Point is: He fucked up by not being able to respond in any fashion whatsoever, which means that regardless of the truth, he is at least partially responsible for what is happening to him now.
Alright, since this entire comment section is a warzone I feel like I need to break this down on a (mostly) objective level.
One one hand we have people who are sympathetic to the alleged (in a legal sense, calm down) victim, share their own thoughts on her and Zalae as they perceive them and are inclined to believe her story based on how it is presented.
On the other hand we have people who refuse to immediately condemn the guy on accusations that lack tangible evidence outside of the victim's account.
Both of these sides are valid, yet both miss some crucial elements.
First of all, the argument that false accusations are statistically rare, while true, should never be used as justification for "just believe the accuser by default". Due process and innocent until proven guilty are still an essential part of any legal (or in this case, court of public opinion) process. Referring to stastistics in order to debunk individual cases is a fallacy. Just because something is unlikely to happen doesn't mean you get a free pass.
Second of all, the other side appears to miss the fact that this is NOT a legal issue. We are not talking about criminal accusations that could result in legal action. Rini, at least to my knowledge, hasn't, at any point, claimed that she wants "justice" or "revenge" or what have you. All she did was tell a personal story out of (according to her) a personal need to inform Zalae's current and future partners about his behaviour, with the additional intent of (according to her) wanting to reach through to him and really show him the extent of his abusive behaviour. The fact that people are framing this as if she's deliberately trying to ruin his life is simply disingenouus. That COULD be her motivation, but there is literally no indicator that it is, meaning that you are now similarly trying to ascribe wrongdoing to her, without having any tangible evidence yourself. If I go on Youtube and tell people how much of a dick a previous accquaintance was, I am not obligated to provide conclusive evidence because I am not insinuating that they did something illegal.
The situation we have on our hands is a single individual coming out about something that clearly has been weighing on her mind for a while. This is most likely therapeutic while also being fueled by a need to "warn" other people. She does all this without ever actually calling for Zalae to be punished/cancelled/whatnot. If anything, this is the RIGHT way to do these kinds of things. If you disagree with this statement it means that you believe that nobody should ever be able to disclose their negative experiences with other people unless they have concrete evidence.
Yes, false accusations, even ones without legal repercussions, have negative effects on people's lives. That is called reputation and it is a core part of human interactions. This is not something we can ever have full control over and trying to completely remove it will just leave you with even more problems.
As it stands, we have the following facts:
-Rini stated her side of the story, her motivation, and her desire to not hurt Zalae's life beyond trying to warn his current/future partners about his "shortcomings" since she feels it's her responsibility. All of this is understandable from an empathetic perspective and there is nothing that suggests she is lying for personal gain or out of revenge (so far).
-Zalae himself has not responded to these allegations (as of yet). This means that we DO NOT HAVE HIS SIDE OF THE STORY. This, however, is his problem. If you get accused of something, it is your responsibility to defend yourself. The fact that he has failed to do this since January at the very least gives the appearance that he does not have a counterclaim. Sure, you can argue that maybe he is preparing some larger legal statement, but that would be very unusual seeing how he was never accused of illegal behaviour in the first place. To sum it up: the ball was in his court and he didn't pick it up. As a result it just isn't possible to "take his side" because he doesn't have one. He couldn't even be bothered to deny it.
-Blizzard did not "fire" Zalae based on baseless accusations. As people pointed out, this shit has been out since the start of the year. The only reason why Blizzard responded now is because of public pressure. Whether or not you agree with it or not is irrelevant, because at the end of the day regardless of the truth, this is the correct PR choice to make by a company trying to maintain their public image. Zalae was suspended based on allegations he himself failed to contest in any way whatsoever. If Blizzard DIDN'T suspend him they would effectively be stating "we are aware of the allegations, but chose to ignore them on account of them not being a big deal". Regardless of whether they are doing the right thing morally, they are OBLIGATED to make the right business decision.
Honestly, I'm pretty disappointed that some people on here are completely incapable of applying nuance to a situation that obviously has more layers to it.
"Innocent until proven guilty", as important as it is, does not free you of the responsibility of contesting the accusations. Zalae failed to defend himself in any shape or form, which is a terrible decision regardless of the truth. Even if he is absolutely guilty of everything and fearing for his reputation, the least he could have done was acknowledge the claims and give a half-assed apology. The only thing that makes you look worse than a false accusation is a lack of response...because then people have no choice other than to assume your guilt.
At the same time, I'm fairly put off by people parroting the "just believe the victims" narrative, because despite all the statistics, it still massively hurts the actual credibility of victims, since the veryy few outliers that maliciously lie for their personal gain will just abuse this general attitude to further their own means. This doesn't means you have to be a fence-sitter or aren't allowed to take Rini's side (fucking hell, I'm on her side, she has presented no contradicting information and her sentiments are entirely relatable) but for fuck's sake, realize that at the end of the day that is all based on your subjective understanding of the situation and making absolute judgement calls based on incomplete information only ends up in pointless virtue signalling. And no, arguing that "well he did always come off as kind of an asshole" is fucking stupid and a prime case of confirmation bias.
The only objective statement about this whole thing is that Zalae is too incompetent to defend himself. Everything else comes down to speculation, so unless you have concrete evidence you should refrain from talking about "the truth" and instead just state your personal opinion on the matter and then leave it there.
Also, as is evident by the delayed launch and the multitude of very strange bugs, it's quite obvious that they just didn't have as much time as they needed and it's very likely that playtesting suffered because of it.
I mean if you look at the history of first expansions for the year, they launched it quite early if you ask me, about 10 days on average earlier. (Earliest: April 2nd (Blackrock) | Latest: April 26 (Old Gods) | Median: April 6th - April 7th)
They absolutely could have given themselves a week of more time but for some reason, be it publisher or manager urging it, or an absolute belief that they were ready... They decided this should be the first expansion released in March since the games own release date in 2014
Oh no I don't mean that they released it too early, I'm saying it quite literally wasn't finished yet (for various reasons, some of which might be pandemic related) but they just couldn't push it back even more.
it's not so much about playrate, but about how they very easily shut down certain archetypes completely and without reasonable counterplay.
I have no problem with them being playable or even popular, but I think they should require more overall support other than just being the best play for their mana cost in most situations.
It's pretty weird to see something that can't even attack and has no flexible usage being included in just about any deck archetype that doesn't already have 30 other cards that are much better by comparison.
I mean, for fuck's sake, even Deathrattle Demon Hunter runs them and that's supposed to be a tempo deck.#
I don't think it's good design if you can win the tempo game by just preventing your opponent from playing the game properly.
They aren't just defensive Neutrals, they're jack of all trades in almost all matchups (except a select few)
At the very least make them more easily removable. It's not fair that Zoolock literally auto-loses the moment someone tosses out Mor'shan....or that a tempo deck can completely shut down druid with a Far Watch Post because they no longer have the means to efficiently get rid of it.
A card this powerful shouuld not have vanilla stats, especially when "can't attack" isn't a drawback. It's like if Ragnaros was a 12/12.
Never a good sign when a deck's worst matchup is itself.
It makes me wonder if Team 5 didn't think people would combine the Libram package (which was already slightly too strong) with the powerful new Secret tools. Did they think the new package would actually weaken the old one? Did they think there was some reason the two wouldn't work well together? Did they simply not test the two packages in the same deck?
It boggles the mind.
I think that might be legit. I think they thought that to run the Secret Package as a draw engine would require too much deidcation to effectively combine it with Librams, so they didn't consider the overlap of the two obviously very powerful archetypes.
Also, as is evident by the delayed launch and the multitude of very strange bugs, it's quite obvious that they just didn't have as much time as they needed and it's very likely that playtesting suffered because of it.
I mean, they clearly didn't playtest Spell Mage that much either or else they would have very quickly realised that DoL gotten that much stronger.
I'm honestly not even mad at the current state of the game. I very much expected something like this to happen, and honestly, if you look at all the other decks that are currently completely overshadowed...they're actually quite diverse. I'm fairly certain that after this initial wave of nerfs (and the second one that takes care of the remaining outliers like Druid or Warlock) we might actually get back to the fairly balanced meta of last expansion.
Alright, I'm gonna just throw out a few predictions.
Deck of Lunacy will be nerfed back into absolute meme status (either by nerfing the cost reduction or upping the cost to the point of redundancy)
Refreshing Spring Water might get hit even if it's hardly the biggest issue given that Spell Mage performs well almost exclusively because the much improved card generation pool.
Font of Power and Apexis Blast may or may not be on the radar too, but I doubt they'll nerf them right away before having seen how the deck performs with any of the above mentioned nerfs.
Sword of the Fallen probably goes up in cost or down in durability (the latter seems to be favoured these days)
Aldor Attendant might be reduced down to a 1/2. Either that or Hand of A'dal gets shafted completely, because holy fuck that combo just autowins the tempo matchup if you go first.
Similarly, First Day of School might also be on the list because not only is it a great way to make sure you can always play for tempo early on, but it also gives Paladin access to 1-drops that are even better than what they already have.
Not entirely sure what Rogue has done to warrant a class card nerf already, but I suspect it has something to with [Hearthstone Card (Self Sharpening Sword) Not Found] or Efficient Octo-bot. I can't actually guess which one it is because I HAVEN'T SEEN ANYTHING OTHER THAN PALADIN AND MAGE FOR THE LAST 3 DAYS.
Neutrals are pretty easy to guess. Both the popular Watchposts are clearly way more common than they want them to be. Pen Flinger is most certainly getting the boot now.
Hopefully they also realise that [Hearthstone Card (Murloc Crabrider) Not Found] is completely broken and finally gut that thing
I think that's because those two are supposed to be images from their lifes to further illustrate the story. Kurtrus is shown abandoning the Illidari and Xyrella does motherly things
no, Thrall is coming later, his new skin is already in the game.
Also, Malfurion Gul'dan (and maybe Illidan I guess?) are still coming down the line. They're just doing different characters inbetween because of the whole theme of the year
I don't think Jaraxxus is that big of a problem, because he only really punishes Control decks that have no win condition.
A well timed Rattlegore can shut Warlock down quite easily, regardless of Jaraxxus. If you're talking about Control Priest, that's just because the deck doesn't have a real win condition (or way to get there yet).
Personally I think that JAraxxus is way overhyped. Realistically, he is unchanged from his previous iteration in pure control matchups because there the health total didn't really matter anyways.
Honestly, i think an overlooked problem in Control Warlock (and other decks in general) is Strongman because that card completely negates the "slow tax" that you would have to pay for really nutty cards like Jaraxxus and Survival of the Fittest.
Either way, getting rid of Tickatus (or just making the cost of playing Tickatus much greater by either turning it into a symmetrical effect or just increasing the mana cost to make corrupting it much harder) is the most important step just because he invalidates other control decks and keeps contributing to the false impression that Warlock is always op when they have healing (they're not, it just so happens that everytime they get proper healing cards they also get an unbeatable win condition shoved up their ass)
I just don't think it'll be enough to really fix the meta in such a way that other classes will be equally viable.
Like...what reason is there to stop playing Paladin or Mage? Libram Paladin still craps on just about every other deck in the game with the only downside being that it can no longer use Pen Flinger for reach. The Sword nerf is almost an indirect buff because it means you can run a smaller secret package (6 total) and still get full value from both swords most of the time.
Meanwhile Mage can easily just run Lunacy as backup because the regular gameplan of Spell Mage is so strong that it only loses to aggro which will get held at bay by the Paladins.
I honestly believe it's going to be the Libram discounters much more than the Librams (also Hand of A'dal, you can't give a ramping midrange/value deck the absolute best 1-2-3 curve in the entire game)
if it's any consolation, there's no way that Paladin won't get hit with a second set of nerfs. They've barely scratched the surface of what makes that class almost unbeatable
Well...I guess it would be the most fitting time now.
Oh wow I didn't think they'd actually nerf the Watch Posts already. They made it sound like they were only watching them for now, but I'm happy to not have to see them in every single deck.
Pen flinger nerf will kill it in Rogue (thank god), but I fear it will leave Paladin unchanged. They mostly just play them for the insane tempo swings anyways (although I suppose it's neat that you no longer have to eat 8 damage every turn while they keep spamming giant recruits.
Sword of the Fallen nerf is pretty significant, but I doubt it will be enough to slow down Libram Paladin, that deck doesn't rely on draw as much as it just steamrolls you from turn 1 on.
Pretty sure Deck of Lunacy nerf does nothing overall. Sure, it's slower and you can't win games starting form turn 2....but the deck itself is still incredibly powerful and Lunacy is now enough to just outvalue slower decks.
Jandice Nerf seems good enough. Making her summon 4-drops would make her unplayable because many of those are just hot garbage. At this point she can't just lock down the game when coined so that's good.
Honestly I'm not all that happy with the nerfs because I feel like the top meta decks will keep being top meta decks, even if they are weaker, while everyone else still has to come to terms with the fact that they can'T beat both Mage and Paladin at the same time.
Probably gonna have another set of nerfs in two weeks...or at least I hope so.
You can only get your own hero power if you currently have a different one, which means your best bet is to just use 2 Yoinks back to back. (Or go Wild and use Finley into Yoink).
just to clarify, I don't think she didn't know what would happen to his career, I'm just saying it's not her actual intent (or at least her proposed motive is credible). She couldn't have talked about the whole thing without that being an inevitable consequence.
Also, I'm not trying to imply that silence = guilt (although I may have phrased that one poorly), but rather that in this specific situation where it would literally just be word vs word it's incredibly irresponsible to not come out with some sort of reaction or acknowledgement.
The Slazo thing was a bit different because he actually got gaslit into thinking he did something way worse than what was actually the case while also being dogpiled by the entire commentary scene. Zalae just wasn't under nearly as much pressure while also having way less severe allegations levied against him.
Point is: He fucked up by not being able to respond in any fashion whatsoever, which means that regardless of the truth, he is at least partially responsible for what is happening to him now.
Alright, since this entire comment section is a warzone I feel like I need to break this down on a (mostly) objective level.
One one hand we have people who are sympathetic to the alleged (in a legal sense, calm down) victim, share their own thoughts on her and Zalae as they perceive them and are inclined to believe her story based on how it is presented.
On the other hand we have people who refuse to immediately condemn the guy on accusations that lack tangible evidence outside of the victim's account.
Both of these sides are valid, yet both miss some crucial elements.
First of all, the argument that false accusations are statistically rare, while true, should never be used as justification for "just believe the accuser by default". Due process and innocent until proven guilty are still an essential part of any legal (or in this case, court of public opinion) process. Referring to stastistics in order to debunk individual cases is a fallacy. Just because something is unlikely to happen doesn't mean you get a free pass.
Second of all, the other side appears to miss the fact that this is NOT a legal issue. We are not talking about criminal accusations that could result in legal action. Rini, at least to my knowledge, hasn't, at any point, claimed that she wants "justice" or "revenge" or what have you. All she did was tell a personal story out of (according to her) a personal need to inform Zalae's current and future partners about his behaviour, with the additional intent of (according to her) wanting to reach through to him and really show him the extent of his abusive behaviour. The fact that people are framing this as if she's deliberately trying to ruin his life is simply disingenouus. That COULD be her motivation, but there is literally no indicator that it is, meaning that you are now similarly trying to ascribe wrongdoing to her, without having any tangible evidence yourself. If I go on Youtube and tell people how much of a dick a previous accquaintance was, I am not obligated to provide conclusive evidence because I am not insinuating that they did something illegal.
The situation we have on our hands is a single individual coming out about something that clearly has been weighing on her mind for a while. This is most likely therapeutic while also being fueled by a need to "warn" other people. She does all this without ever actually calling for Zalae to be punished/cancelled/whatnot. If anything, this is the RIGHT way to do these kinds of things. If you disagree with this statement it means that you believe that nobody should ever be able to disclose their negative experiences with other people unless they have concrete evidence.
Yes, false accusations, even ones without legal repercussions, have negative effects on people's lives. That is called reputation and it is a core part of human interactions. This is not something we can ever have full control over and trying to completely remove it will just leave you with even more problems.
As it stands, we have the following facts:
-Rini stated her side of the story, her motivation, and her desire to not hurt Zalae's life beyond trying to warn his current/future partners about his "shortcomings" since she feels it's her responsibility. All of this is understandable from an empathetic perspective and there is nothing that suggests she is lying for personal gain or out of revenge (so far).
-Zalae himself has not responded to these allegations (as of yet). This means that we DO NOT HAVE HIS SIDE OF THE STORY. This, however, is his problem. If you get accused of something, it is your responsibility to defend yourself. The fact that he has failed to do this since January at the very least gives the appearance that he does not have a counterclaim. Sure, you can argue that maybe he is preparing some larger legal statement, but that would be very unusual seeing how he was never accused of illegal behaviour in the first place. To sum it up: the ball was in his court and he didn't pick it up. As a result it just isn't possible to "take his side" because he doesn't have one. He couldn't even be bothered to deny it.
-Blizzard did not "fire" Zalae based on baseless accusations. As people pointed out, this shit has been out since the start of the year. The only reason why Blizzard responded now is because of public pressure. Whether or not you agree with it or not is irrelevant, because at the end of the day regardless of the truth, this is the correct PR choice to make by a company trying to maintain their public image. Zalae was suspended based on allegations he himself failed to contest in any way whatsoever. If Blizzard DIDN'T suspend him they would effectively be stating "we are aware of the allegations, but chose to ignore them on account of them not being a big deal". Regardless of whether they are doing the right thing morally, they are OBLIGATED to make the right business decision.
Honestly, I'm pretty disappointed that some people on here are completely incapable of applying nuance to a situation that obviously has more layers to it.
"Innocent until proven guilty", as important as it is, does not free you of the responsibility of contesting the accusations. Zalae failed to defend himself in any shape or form, which is a terrible decision regardless of the truth. Even if he is absolutely guilty of everything and fearing for his reputation, the least he could have done was acknowledge the claims and give a half-assed apology. The only thing that makes you look worse than a false accusation is a lack of response...because then people have no choice other than to assume your guilt.
At the same time, I'm fairly put off by people parroting the "just believe the victims" narrative, because despite all the statistics, it still massively hurts the actual credibility of victims, since the veryy few outliers that maliciously lie for their personal gain will just abuse this general attitude to further their own means. This doesn't means you have to be a fence-sitter or aren't allowed to take Rini's side (fucking hell, I'm on her side, she has presented no contradicting information and her sentiments are entirely relatable) but for fuck's sake, realize that at the end of the day that is all based on your subjective understanding of the situation and making absolute judgement calls based on incomplete information only ends up in pointless virtue signalling. And no, arguing that "well he did always come off as kind of an asshole" is fucking stupid and a prime case of confirmation bias.
The only objective statement about this whole thing is that Zalae is too incompetent to defend himself. Everything else comes down to speculation, so unless you have concrete evidence you should refrain from talking about "the truth" and instead just state your personal opinion on the matter and then leave it there.
Oh no I don't mean that they released it too early, I'm saying it quite literally wasn't finished yet (for various reasons, some of which might be pandemic related) but they just couldn't push it back even more.
it's not so much about playrate, but about how they very easily shut down certain archetypes completely and without reasonable counterplay.
I have no problem with them being playable or even popular, but I think they should require more overall support other than just being the best play for their mana cost in most situations.
It's pretty weird to see something that can't even attack and has no flexible usage being included in just about any deck archetype that doesn't already have 30 other cards that are much better by comparison.
I mean, for fuck's sake, even Deathrattle Demon Hunter runs them and that's supposed to be a tempo deck.#
I don't think it's good design if you can win the tempo game by just preventing your opponent from playing the game properly.
They aren't just defensive Neutrals, they're jack of all trades in almost all matchups (except a select few)
At the very least make them more easily removable. It's not fair that Zoolock literally auto-loses the moment someone tosses out Mor'shan....or that a tempo deck can completely shut down druid with a Far Watch Post because they no longer have the means to efficiently get rid of it.
A card this powerful shouuld not have vanilla stats, especially when "can't attack" isn't a drawback. It's like if Ragnaros was a 12/12.
I think that might be legit. I think they thought that to run the Secret Package as a draw engine would require too much deidcation to effectively combine it with Librams, so they didn't consider the overlap of the two obviously very powerful archetypes.
Also, as is evident by the delayed launch and the multitude of very strange bugs, it's quite obvious that they just didn't have as much time as they needed and it's very likely that playtesting suffered because of it.
I mean, they clearly didn't playtest Spell Mage that much either or else they would have very quickly realised that DoL gotten that much stronger.
I'm honestly not even mad at the current state of the game. I very much expected something like this to happen, and honestly, if you look at all the other decks that are currently completely overshadowed...they're actually quite diverse. I'm fairly certain that after this initial wave of nerfs (and the second one that takes care of the remaining outliers like Druid or Warlock) we might actually get back to the fairly balanced meta of last expansion.
You can't make this shit up
Alright, I'm gonna just throw out a few predictions.
Deck of Lunacy will be nerfed back into absolute meme status (either by nerfing the cost reduction or upping the cost to the point of redundancy)
Refreshing Spring Water might get hit even if it's hardly the biggest issue given that Spell Mage performs well almost exclusively because the much improved card generation pool.
Font of Power and Apexis Blast may or may not be on the radar too, but I doubt they'll nerf them right away before having seen how the deck performs with any of the above mentioned nerfs.
Sword of the Fallen probably goes up in cost or down in durability (the latter seems to be favoured these days)
Aldor Attendant might be reduced down to a 1/2. Either that or Hand of A'dal gets shafted completely, because holy fuck that combo just autowins the tempo matchup if you go first.
Similarly, First Day of School might also be on the list because not only is it a great way to make sure you can always play for tempo early on, but it also gives Paladin access to 1-drops that are even better than what they already have.
Not entirely sure what Rogue has done to warrant a class card nerf already, but I suspect it has something to with [Hearthstone Card (Self Sharpening Sword) Not Found] or Efficient Octo-bot. I can't actually guess which one it is because I HAVEN'T SEEN ANYTHING OTHER THAN PALADIN AND MAGE FOR THE LAST 3 DAYS.
Neutrals are pretty easy to guess. Both the popular Watchposts are clearly way more common than they want them to be. Pen Flinger is most certainly getting the boot now.
Hopefully they also realise that [Hearthstone Card (Murloc Crabrider) Not Found] is completely broken and finally gut that thing
I think that's because those two are supposed to be images from their lifes to further illustrate the story. Kurtrus is shown abandoning the Illidari and Xyrella does motherly things
looks like that's what they're going for, considering the fairly androgynous appearance and all.
Give me those Tamsin ones as hero portraits.
Now.
no
don't
embrace it
no, Thrall is coming later, his new skin is already in the game.
Also, Malfurion Gul'dan (and maybe Illidan I guess?) are still coming down the line. They're just doing different characters inbetween because of the whole theme of the year
I don't think Jaraxxus is that big of a problem, because he only really punishes Control decks that have no win condition.
A well timed Rattlegore can shut Warlock down quite easily, regardless of Jaraxxus. If you're talking about Control Priest, that's just because the deck doesn't have a real win condition (or way to get there yet).
Personally I think that JAraxxus is way overhyped. Realistically, he is unchanged from his previous iteration in pure control matchups because there the health total didn't really matter anyways.
Honestly, i think an overlooked problem in Control Warlock (and other decks in general) is Strongman because that card completely negates the "slow tax" that you would have to pay for really nutty cards like Jaraxxus and Survival of the Fittest.
Either way, getting rid of Tickatus (or just making the cost of playing Tickatus much greater by either turning it into a symmetrical effect or just increasing the mana cost to make corrupting it much harder) is the most important step just because he invalidates other control decks and keeps contributing to the false impression that Warlock is always op when they have healing (they're not, it just so happens that everytime they get proper healing cards they also get an unbeatable win condition shoved up their ass)
don't forget Murloc Crabrider.
Why the fuck is there a 2-mana 1/4 with Rush AND windfury that just so happens to perfectly scale with Hand of A'dal.
Also, why are Caravans 1/3s. Buff those to 1/4 for fuck's sake